Representation by Caroline Baldry
- Date submitted
- 11 January 2020
- Submitted by
- Members of the public/businesses
My partner came to unspoilt Friston in 1992. I totally agree with him that these are monstrous and devastating proposals and that they are in total isolation from any regionally coherent strategy on the cumulative effects of Sizewell C Nuclear Power, Nautilus & Eurolink National Grid Interconnectors and the expansion of the Galloper and Greater Gabbard offshore windfarms. There is no strategy! The proposals are in the wrong place and with a proposed cable corridor that is as bizarre as it is destructive. That the SPR cables come onshore at the fragile, beautiful cliffs at Thorpeness is quite beyond belief. They turn north to Sizewell, and then follow the existing overhead power line close to Leiston, Aldringham and Knodishall and finish up in Friston with a 35-acre substation development and associated revisions to the overhead cables. Cable trenches require construction corridors of 50-60m and will detrimentally affect main roads, 26 Rights of Way and parts of the Suffolk Coast & Heaths AONB as well as the Sandlings Walk. The distance? Over 10 kilometres! Years of visual, noise and light pollution will have hugely detrimental effects on the amenities of thousands of residents and road users. Ten kilometres of cable trenches - that’s starting at the Houses of Parliament and trenching all the way to Hampstead Heath. The 35-acre development site in Friston wraps itself between homes and their gardens. It is a greenfield site to be filled with concrete and tarmac and developed with huge, 18-metre-high constructions in a concrete and metal industrial compound. The 20-year construction period and the lifetime of operation will give light pollution at night, continuous noise pollution day and night, not least from the ‘harmonic filters’, and will severely compromise the already inadequate drainage infrastructure. This development will destroy the whole village of peaceful Friston. It will blight and devastate our lives forever – for the rest of our lives. There is scant consideration for the damage to the landscape, the environment and its ecology, including several of our very favourite dog walks, nor to the damage and stress this is having on Friston residents. The construction access proposals are unbelievable. The A1094 cannot presently cope with two passing lorries and cars must slow or stop on sections of this road. The massive increase in traffic and the introduction of HGV and Abnormal Load traffic on country roads would be disastrous. Tinkering with junctions and speed limits would have no effect and any other existing route would be unthinkable. This route would be traffic mismanagement on a grand scale. Could rational planning really believe this possible? Maybe only the National Grid does. If these destructive proposals become reality, it will be a travesty of real-world justice. If the Secretary of State allows it, then it will surely demonstrate that there is a presumption in favour of permanently ruining, at massive expense, the lives of many hundreds of people, their offspring and successors, for an otherwise laudable need to increase renewable energy.